Many businesses employ service providers to supply and maintain dispensing systems, including paper towel, toilet paper, and soap dispensers. The service provider must ensure that the dispenser does not empty prior to the next scheduled maintenance, while avoiding unnecessary replacement of product, which increases cost in both service time and the product itself. Therefore, there is a need to predict the depletion of product several weeks in advance and provide indication of the same to the service provider.
Dispenser indicators for low product are widely known in the art. However, known dispensers provide indication by fixed recordings of information. In other words, a dispenser will incorporate a counter or sensor that triggers a warning based from a constant value. One disadvantage of these prior-art devices is that they may trigger a warning only after complete consumption of the product. Another disadvantage inherent to these prior-art devices is the inability to predict whether the dispenser requires replacement resulting from the dispenser's varying usage.
Improvements have been made in the art to incorporate more parameters in determining when product should be refilled. One example is U.S. Pat. No. 4,830,791 to Muderlak et al., which teaches an odor-control device in the nature of an olfactory unit that can power up with the detection of a user or can be controlled by a fan-timer circuit. The fan-timer circuit allows the operation of dispensing for a predetermined span of time. The dispenser has a timer circuit that produces a pulse every fifteen minutes and a counter that monitors these pulses. Once the pulse reaches a predetermined number, an indicator light flashes to represent that the cartridge may potentially be empty. However, Muderlak et al. does not compensate for the random use that is characteristic of a large portion of product dispensers.
Another example is U.S. Pat. No. 5,772,074 belonging to Dial et al. Dial et al. teaches an approach to calculate the dispensing of a predetermined amount of a material. The '074 patent teaches a method wherein a dispensing score representative of the time of operation of a dispenser multiplied by a factor representative of the frequency or intensity of dispensing is calculated, and the calculated dispensing score is compared with a predetermined total score. The '074 patent discloses an alarm when the dispensing score is greater than the predetermined total score. The '074 patent does not indicate when the dispenser is almost out of fluid but triggers a warning when it is believed that complete consumption has occurred. In addition, the frequency is not determined from random use but is controlled by a preset frequency. Therefore, there is a need to predict and provide warning of the future emptying of a random-use product dispenser.
Thus, because of the time-consuming nature of checking the refill container of each dispenser, it would be beneficial to be able to anticipate with a reasonable level of accuracy when a refill container is likely to need replacement. By accurately anticipating when a refill container needs to be replaced, the individual may reduce the frequency with which he or she checks specific dispensers for depleted or inoperable refill containers. As a result, the individual would be able to allocate the time otherwise spent checking non-depleted or operable refill containers toward checking and replacing additional depleted refill containers.
Therefore, there is a need for a method and device that indicates the future need for replenishing a product, which reduces the frequency with which an individual is required to check to determine if a refill container requires replacement.